Medical students directed by HC to pay excess fees

Mumbai: The Bombay high court has rejected a writ petition filed by 45 medical students of a private medical college in Chiplun and directed them to pay the fee demanded by the college as the Fee Regulatory Authority (FRA) has submitted that the college needed to charge fees to recover the deficit of the hospital that was started along with the college. In the petition, the students claimed that as there are 300 students, the college can easily recover the Rs 16 cr annual expenditure by charging an annual fee of Rs 5.33 lakh from each student but was recovering fees at the rate of Rs 7.75 lakh.

A division bench of justices B.R. Gavai and Sandeep Shinde was hearing the petition of the students who sought directions to the college to not charge the Rs 7.75 lakh fee recommended by the FRA as it was based on a 200 student denominator while the denominator was 300 students. The senior advocate appearing for the students argued that the college was able to recover its annual expenditure from the fee charged from 200 students and the fee recovered from the remaining 100 students was in excess of its requirements.  

The advocate also informed the court that the teachers on the roll of the college were not regular teachers and hence the expenditure shown by the college was doubtful.

The college however submitted an affidavit enumerating the report of the FRA which said that as a new 500 bed hospital was made for the college after the college was started in 2014, there was a deficit and hence the college was allowed to recover Rs 7.75 lakh fee.

After hearing both the sides, the court upheld the FRA recommendations and asked the students to pay accordingly. Regarding the teacher’s issue the court said that as it was not part of the prayer in the petition, the students were at a liberty to file a separate petition.